Abbott, Davis careful of company they keep

For Abbott, it's Patrick; for Davis, Obama

AUSTIN ? As much as politicians want themselves seen during campaigns, the company they are seen with, or not seen with, is equally important.

With President Barack Obama having come to Texas recently, the gubernatorial campaign of Republican Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott harked back to a point regarding the POTUS and Abbott's gubernatorial rival, Democratic state Sen. Wendy Davis of Fort Worth.

Namely, that she seemed to not want to be seen with Obama.

"Sen. Davis and President Obama are two peas in a pod, from their shared support of Obamacare to higher taxes on Texas families," Abbott's campaign Communications Director Matt Hirsch said in a statement. "As the President travels to Texas to fundraise without bothering to visit the border, Sen. Davis is nowhere to be found.

"If Sen. Davis is serious about addressing our border crisis ? as she claims to be ? she would publicly urge President Obama to step up and do his job in helping secure the border. But once again, on an issue where Greg Abbott has taken the lead, Sen. Davis continues to partake in craven and opportunistic political attacks. Serious times call for serious leaders, but Sen. Davis is California dreamin'."

So it's a little over the top rhetorically, but it's a point the campaign made last time when Obama visited Texas for a civil rights summit and met with Davis out of sight. The Abbott campaign went as far as trying to get pictures of the meeting from the White House, but to no avail.

The Davis campaign has had its own accusations of avoidance on Abbott's part. Campaign staff have suggested that Abbott doesn't want to be seen with state Sen. Dan Patrick, R-Houston.

In a release about the Texas Republican Party convention last month, the Davis campaign wrote:

"What is quite startling about the convention is that more than a week after being nominated as the Republican lieutenant governor candidate, Dan Patrick and Greg Abbott have yet to appear as a team to showcase their track record undermining Texas women, Latinos and the state's education system."

Rice University political science professor Mark Jones said there may be some issues of avoidance on both sides, although neither campaign will probably want to admit it.

Requests for comment from Abbottt elicited no response. Davis reportedly affirmed that she was not trying to avoid Obama on the day he came to Texas, and a spokeswoman for her campaign highlighted that Davis met with Obama in April.

Even so, for Davis, Obama is unpopular in Texas, and publicizing time spent with the president may not do much to win over votes.

"Davis realizes that she is going to be linked to Obama," Jones said. "By the same token, she doesn't want to do anything that unnecessarily ties her to the president. The difficulty for Davis is that it's more easy to tie Davis to Obama than Abbott to Dan Patrick."

Abbott, on the other hand, has been trying to court the Hispanic vote, and some of Patrick's statements ? quotes about an "illegal invasion" ? may not help Abbott's cause.

"I would suspect that Greg Abbott has to try to not alienate Hispanics and to reach out to centrist voters. Dan Patrick to win the primary went against the grain on both of those things," Jones said.

That and "historically Patrick is something of a wild card," Jones said.

Both candidates thus may have company they might not want to keep too closely as November's election draws near.

Matthew Waller covers state news for Scripps Newspapers and works in Austin. Contact him at mwaller@gosanangelo.com or follow him on Twitter @waller_matthew.